


Then and Now

by nmnostalgiadrabbles



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Canon Compliant, M/M, They just love each other a lot, from childhood to post-time skip
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-29
Updated: 2021-01-29
Packaged: 2021-03-15 22:14:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,030
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29071602
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nmnostalgiadrabbles/pseuds/nmnostalgiadrabbles
Summary: The story of Oikawa and Iwaizumi, through kisses, time, and distance.
Relationships: Iwaizumi Hajime/Oikawa Tooru
Comments: 4
Kudos: 34





	Then and Now

**Author's Note:**

> hello! nmnostalgiadrabbles from tumblr! this is my first fic here so pls be gentle!
> 
> originally i posted this in 3 separate parts on tumblr, and then mashed them all together in another post, and now im posting them here lol. is it just me or is tumblr not rlly the place to find/read ff?
> 
> anyway, thanks for reading!!

They’ve kissed more than their teammates might think. 

The first time, they're twelve, on one of their days off from practice in the summer and they’d spent all morning searching for caterpillars. 

They come in for watermelon and a break from the sun and humidity, that, once they’re upstairs reading Iwaizumi’s comic books splayed out on the floor, turns into a nap. A half hour later, they wake, and Godzilla resumes defending Japan from another kaiju terrorizing the earth on glossy pages beneath sticky fingers. They talk a little as they read, about caterpillars and the upcoming school year, volleyball and what Iwaizumi’s mom is making for dinner. 

“What do you think kissing is like?” Oikawa says, stretched out on his back with his hands folded on his stomach. He’s counting the plastic glow-in-the-dark stars on Iwaizumi’s ceiling, even though he knows there are forty-seven. “Makki and Hanna got married on the playground the other day and got in trouble for kissing.”

Iwaizumi grunts, uninterested really, but a couple moments pass and he decides he’d like to know too. After all, he and Oikawa compete in just about everything else; he can’t lose here either - this is for science, and this is for pride - even if he is feeling kind of chicken. So he sits up cross legged, and Oikawa follows, and they don’t say a lot, but before they lean in, Oikawa asks, “Should we close our eyes?”

Iwaizumi hasn’t a clue but he says he thinks so. 

And it’s exactly what an experimental kiss between twelve-year old best friends should be: scrunched up faces and pursed lips that meet only for a second before they pull away and look at each other again.

Iwaizumi grunts again, shrugging a shoulder, and Oikawa agrees. 

“Yeah, don’t really get what all the fuss was about.”

The second time, they’re fifteen, and its after Oikawa’s knee starts hurting during practice. Aside from sets that aren’t up to Oikawa’s own standard – but still entirely hittable, Iwaizumi thinks – Iwaizumi knows his partner well-enough to see that something isn’t right. He doesn’t mention it during practice, and neither do the coaches; they probably think he’s just having an off day. He’d been kind of tightly wound since Kageyama had taken his place in that match, after all. 

They walk home together, where usually Oikawa is skipping about in front of him, going on about his latest girlfriend, but today, he lags behind in strange silence.

Iwaizumi turns to face him and goes for normalcy. “Shittykawa, spit it out.”

Oikawa looks up. Iwaizumi wants to see his face twist into that all-too-familiar shit-eating grin. Instead, he notices Oikawa looks pale. He’s leaning to one side – weight on one foot – and says, in a voice Iwaizumi has never heard before, “It hurts, Iwa-chan.”

They make it home to Iwaizumi’s, because Oikawa’s parents are out of town and he’s staying over, and Iwaizumi helps him up the stairs and onto his bed, leaving him for a moment to retrieve an ice pack from the refrigerator downstairs. He offers ibuprofen too, but Oikawa says he needs to be able to feel it.

“What? Why?”

Oikawa mumbles out an answer that Iwaizumi doesn’t like: that he needs it to hurt to remind him to try harder.

“Don’t be a dumbass. Your play is already suffering; if you continue like this, it’ll get worse and then Kageyama will take your place for good.”

Oikawa frowns and looks away from Iwaizumi, who’s kneeling at his legs and holding the ice pack in place. 

“I want you setting for me, not him.” Then he stands and chastely kisses the top of Oikawa’s head, hair unreasonably soft, in one quick motion. 

“Iwa-chan, if you wanted to kiss me you could have just said so,”

Iwaizumi slaps the back of his head and stomps downstairs to start dinner. 

The third time, they’re seventeen, cicadas call loudly, and they’ve come back from a run. They’ve just had lunch, and Iwaizumi tastes like peanut butter and Oikawa like a popsicle. 

“‘Blue’ isn’t even a flavor, it’s a color,” he says, and Oikawa sticks his purple tongue out. Iwaizumi makes a face, but Oikawa’s put a hand behind his head and leisurely, like he’s done it as often as he’s served a volleyball, kisses Iwaizumi. It isn’t like when they were twelve. 

Oikawa pulls back, triumphant, saying, “See, there is flavor.”

The fourth time, they’re eighteen, getting ready for bed early because they’ve a match in the morning, brushing their teeth in Oikawa’s bathroom, play-fighting with elbows until Oikawa swallows some toothpaste and hacks over the sink while Iwaizumi, already rinsed clean, cackles behind him till his stomach hurts. Oikawa catches his breath and rinses eventually, and turns to Iwaizumi, who recognizes the danger immediately. He intends to flee from the bathroom, but Oikawa, long-limbed and oddly flexible, manages the get the door shut. Iwaizumi does his best to look intimidating, but Oikawa smiles confidently and ghosts his hands over Iwaizumi’s ribs. Involuntarily, Iwaizumi shudders as Oikawa says, “Please, Iwa-chan. In close quarters like this, you don’t stand a chance. I know your weakness.”

Iwaizumi swallows, mouth parted in a nervous, have mercy smile, but Oikawa will have none of it. The same fingers that deliver the only sets Iwaizumi could ever ask for tickle his sides till he wheezes and tears form. He breaks mostly free and reaches for the doorknob, but Oikawa seizes the opening and then Iwaizumi’s back to laughing and trying desperately to grab hold of Oikawa’s hands while still defending himself. A few misfires, but eventually he gets one and holds it behind Oikawa’s back and the edge of the vanity while he nabs the other wrist and takes them both his is calloused hand. He presses forward with his whole body, still breathing heavy, but finally, finally he can relax.

Oikawa smirks. “I could get free if I wanted to.”

Iwaizumi scoffs. “No you couldn’t.” 

Oikawa’s smirk remains, and entirely too confidently for someone with his arms pinned behind him, he leans forward and looks Iwaizumi directly in the eyes as he kisses him. It’s brief, so he can pull back and raise his hands and wiggle his fingers. 

“Told ya,” he says, and Iwaizumi expects him to cross his arms over his chest and continue gloating, but he doesn’t. Well, he still gloats, but he puts his hands on Iwaizumi’s sides again, and Iwaizumi sucks in a breath.

“I like them here better. Don’t you?” 

Iwaizumi swallows. Looks at Oikawa, all smiles and lidded eyes, and decides this time will be different. 

So he pushes forward and they kiss there, in the warm light of the half-bath off the corner of Iwaizumi’s room, with open mouths and think they’ve finally understood what all the fuss is about. Iwaizumi half-wonders if maybe Oikawa understood a while ago, because he moves himself and directs Iwaizumi with a confidence Iwaizumi doesn’t have yet. At some point though, they separate, and Iwaizumi is pleased to find Oikawa’s face – and mouth – as red as his feels. 

They hear the front door close and Iwaizumi’s mom call out. Iwaizumi wavers, but Oikawa grabs his face and kisses him hard, and a moment later darts out the door, down the stairs and in into, Iwaizumi suspects, the kitchen, where he’ll be hiding behind Iwaizumi’s own mother. Iwaizumi clambers after him.

The fifth time, they’re still eighteen, but they’ve just lost to Karasuno. Oikawa knows it isn’t the end for him, but it’s bitter, because it’s the end for him and Iwaizumi. 

He’s glad when Iwaizumi turns up at the Shiratorizawa-Karasuno showdown. He’d been afraid to reach out and meet up formally because what if it hurt? He didn’t feel like crying anymore; he’d done enough of that. And it does hurt, them analyzing the match together. Hearing Iwaizumi call him an asshole and laughing because he knows it’s true. Toward the end, Oikawa, unsure, says, “I was imagining it was us out there.” 

“Me too.”

They get coffee. Iwaizumi remarks about how little crème Oikawa gets in his.

“I’ve got to start taking care of myself,” Oikawa replies, and Iwaizumi reads between the lines.

“Come back to my place. I’ll make dinner.”

“‘Your place?’ You still live with your parents, Iwa-chan,”

Iwaizumi huffs. “They’re out. We’ll have to stop at the grocery first. Guess I oughtta teach you how to do that too, huh.”

Oikawa smiles, but when Iwaizumi turns and heads out the café door, it slips.

He wants to enjoy these last moments together, so he laughs and teases Iwaizumi like he should, but it’s hard, so after dinner when Iwaizumi puts a movie on, Oikawa excuses himself to the bathroom upstairs, sees the toothpaste on the counter, and cries. He’s in the there entirely too long and knows Iwaizumi is probably getting suspicious, but he’s still surprised when he opens the door to find Iwaizumi flipping through an old comic book on his bed.

Oikawa sniffs.

Iwaizumi pats the space next to him.

Oikawa curls beside him with his head on Iwaizumi’s stomach and tries to breathe without shaking. Iwaizumi puts the comic book down. They’d done this before. Oikawa had cried in front of Iwaizumi more times that he’d cried alone, though he can’t help but think that will be changing. Universities across the world from each other – how could they ever hope to close that distance?

“I know you’re thinking.”

“Iwa-chan had a thought?” Oikawa hides his face in Iwaizumi’s sweatshirt. 

“I’m trying to be genuine here, asshole.”

Oikawa has a decision to make – allow Iwaizumi to start this conversation, the one he wants to pretend won’t happen if he avoids it, or try to enjoy one of their last nights together. He isn’t sure he can do either.

He feels a hand in his hair, soft and warm, and though he knows Iwaizumi is offering comfort, Oikawa needs to take more. So he sits up, sets his glasses on Iwaizumi’s bed-side table, and moves to straddle his best friend’s waist. 

Iwaizumi is taken aback. He’s perceptive, but Oikawa can be a mystery if he really wants to be, and now, Iwaizumi notes, is one of those times. He waits. Watches Oikawa’s chest rise and fall.

Oikawa puts his hands on Iwaizumi’s chest. He can do this. He wants to do this. He has to do this. There likely won’t be another chance. With worry and separation in the back of his mind, he leans down and kisses Iwaizumi. Iwaizumi kisses him back, moves his hands to either side of Oikawa’s waist, above the hips but below the ribs, which is an incredible relief; Oikawa had half-expected Iwaizumi to say no, we shouldn’t, not like this, or worse, just no, because he didn’t want Oikawa the way Oikawa wanted him. That just because they’d kissed a couple times didn’t mean he’d mourn him from how-ever many thousand miles away. How could Oikawa blame him? They weren’t even twenty, and Iwaizumi was going to move on from volleyball. He was going to study sports medicine in college, but that wasn’t a team sport; Oikawa couldn’t be a part of that world, and maybe that was for the better. Maybe that was what Iwaizumi wanted. 

Oikawa feels sick at the thought, and decides that at least for this moment and the few that will follow, he'll be something Iwaizumi wants.

Oikawa kisses him in what he thinks is the sexiest way possible. Tongue, but not too much, just enough to tease, because that about sums up his entire personality, doesn’t it? If Iwaizumi could read his thoughts he would have said no, you’re entirely too much, all the time.

Oikawa holds back tears.

He presses his hips down and wills himself to feel something that doesn’t hurt. He trails wet kisses from Iwaizumi’s mouth to his jaw to his neck – the kind that leaves bruises – and Iwaizumi, who is breathing faster than normal, whose hands roam from Oikawa’s sides to his shoulder blades to his hair, makes a noise Oikawa hasn’t heard before. Oikawa’s chest tightens.

It stops when Oikawa pauses and opens his eyes because he stupidly, stupidly wanted to see what Iwaizumi, what Haijime looked like beneath him. It’s everything he’s hoped for – flushed down to his neck, red, shiny lips parted perfectly for his own, eyes shut almost tightly, almost like it was too much and Oikawa would cement this moment, this Haijime in the back of his mind for the rest of his life – but Iwaizumi opens his eyes, why Oikawa didn’t know, and for a reason Oikawa is frustrated he can’t overcome, Iwaizumi blinks and it’s too late, it’s over Oikawa recognizes; Iwaizumi has been snapped from the moment Oikawa had tried so desperately to create, and all the ones he’d hoped would come after.

“Oikawa,”

How could he live without hearing Iwaizumi say his name like that ever again? Say his name at all?

“Oikawa, what’s wrong?”

So it had been his fault after all. He’s given himself away, but isn’t sure how until Iwaizumi brings a hand to his cheek and Oikawa feels him thumb wetness away. 

Iwaizumi sits up as best he can, pillows at his back, and looks at Oikawa with the furrowed brow Oikawa had loved from the moment Iwaizumi’s face had first scrunched up when they were five and Iwaizumi had stepped in water with his sock feet.

Oikawa hunches down with his fists in the fabric of Iwaizumi’s sweatshirt and doesn’t care that he sounds like a child.

“It hurts, Iwa-chan,”

Iwaizumi puts his arms around Oikawa’s shoulders.

“I know,” he says. Oikawa raises abruptly; had he heard that right? The tremor in Iwaizumi’s voice?

He finds Iwaizumi is crying too. 

“I said I knew what you were thinking, didn’t I?”

Oikawa can’t help it – he laughs. They spend a moment wiping their faces and sniffing, and then Oikawa says what he’s always felt.

“I love you.”

He’s never imagined how Iwaizumi would react to hearing those words from him because he’s never imagined himself really and actually saying them. 

But maybe Iwaizumi has, because he says without hesitation, “I love you, too.”

And even though not all of the ache is gone, enough is that Oikawa can grin again, honestly, and says, “Iwa-chan that’s so embarrassing!”

Maybe Iwaizumi hadn’t thought that far ahead, because he balks for a moment, but only a moment since this is Shittykawa after all, and launches himself into Oikawa’s torso so convincingly they tumble off his bed and this time, Iwaizumi makes sure he comes out on top so he can mercilessly dole out payback for that time in the bathroom. Oikawa writhes and shrieks beneath him with smiles Iwaizumi catalogues for when they can’t torture each other like this every night. Because Iwaizumi is so pleased with himself, he takes Oikawa’s wrists in one hand and pins them above his head, further pleased at the blush that spreads across Oikawa’s cheeks and ears. He basks in his victory and tries his hand at the patented Oikawa smirk.

“You can’t kiss me now,” he says.

Oikawa goes still beneath him, surprise evident.

“Guess you’ll just have to let me do that part.”

Oikawa’s eyes narrow, but he grins and licks his lips. 

.

They don’t actually talk about who won or lost. There’s a jab and a comeback and then they just laugh. They separate to celebrate with their own teams, out for dinner, but Iwaizumi tells Oikawa to come by his room later.

Oikawa makes likes he’s offended, going as far as to summon a faux blush and says, “Aren’t you supposed to take me out first?”

Iwaizumi rolls his eyes and says, “I want to check out your knee. I know you’ve got your own trainer, but a second opinion never hurt anyone.”

Oikawa leans close, and Iwaizumi breathes once, twice, his sweat and deodorant and the way he’s smelled since they were kids. Feels the hand hot on his shoulder.

“But what if I want it to?”

But then he pulls back and he’s just one big shit-eating grin.

Iwaizumi laughs. “I don’t know why I thought you’d mature,”

Oikawa’s teammates call him over, apparently there’s an interviewer waiting for him, which doesn’t surprise Iwaizumi at all, so Oikawa just says for Iwaizumi to text him his room number.

It’s late when he comes by, and Iwaizumi hounds him about getting enough sleep. Oikawa falls with a huff on the twin bed by the window.

“Who’s the one keeping me up?”

Iwaizumi comes to stand at the foot. “This doesn’t count; it’s for good reason.”

“You think you’re worth losing sleep?”

Iwaizumi forgot how often he rolled his eyes when in Oikawa’s presence. “Sit up, put your feet on the floor, legs a ninety-degree angle.”

Oikawa complies, and in his best nauseatingly-sweet voice asks a third question. “Do you talk to all your players like that?” 

Iwaizumi kneels in front of him and then realizes.

“Tell me you’re wearing something under those?”

Oikawa nearly short-circuits thinking up the perfect response but he just ends up laughing and stepping out of his sweats.

“Thank God.” Iwaizumi resumes his place kneeling on the patterned carpet and put his hands on Oikawa’s thigh.

“It’s the other one,” Oikawa says.

“I know. But you can’t be trusted not to fuck yourself up for volleyball.”

Oikawa snorts. A few moments later, Iwaizumi moves to the other, pressing into the tissues carefully. A little longer, and then he uses his thumbs to dig.

“Tell me if anything hurts.” He scoffs and corrects himself. “Tell me what hurts.”

“Is it so hard to believe I’ve learned to take care of myself?”

Iwaizumi moves one hand to the other knee and feels them simultaneously for comparison. “It really is.”

Oikawa doesn’t say anything, just watches Iwaizumi continue his examination. He thinks about reaching a hand up to feel Iwaizumi’s hair.

“Okay, lie back.”

“Oh good, the fun part.” Oikawa winks and Iwaizumi flicks him. 

“The first thing you do when we see each other after all this time is feel me up and physically abuse me, Iwaizumi? Can’t say I’m surprised.”

Iwaizumi holds Oikawa’s ankle in one hand and behind his knee above the calf in the other. He puts a knee on the bed and presses forward. Only when Oikawa’s thigh is entirely flush to his chest does he wince. Iwaizumi watches him for a moment, as Oikawa pointedly looks up at the ceiling.

“Fucker,” Iwaizumi says. “You’re supposed to say when it hurts.”

“I didn’t want you to stop,”

They’re quiet for a moment, looking at each other, till Iwaizumi releases Oikawa’s leg and settles between his thighs. He moves forward, slowly, because it’s been too, too long since he’d torchered Oikawa proper. One hand on Oikawa’s right side, the other on his left, and he bends down like he’s going to kiss him. But he stops and breathes, leans back just enough when Oikawa lifts his head to meet, and chuckles at his irritation. Oikawa squints, takes the fabric of his shirt in his fists and finally – because honestly it had been torture for Iwaizumi, too – they’re kissing. 

They’re steady for a beat, until Iwaizumi feels a hand tug his hair and then they’re touching all over and scrambling for purchase to bring themselves closer, as close as physically possible after being continents apart, and mold into one another. 

Then Iwaizumi pulls away for just a moment because he really wants to see what Oikawa looks like kissed stupid after so, so long. 

“God,” he breathes.

“You haven’t called me that in some time,” Oikawa manages, and Iwaizumi laughs. The texts, the phone calls – they’d been enough because they were all the two of them had had for months on end, for years, but now, to see Oikawa blush for him, feel his mouth open for him? Iwaizumi doesn’t cry, but Oikawa reaches up to kiss his cheek like he had. Then he licks the same spot with what felt like basset-hound level slobber and falls back in hysterics while he watches Iwaizumi furiously rub his face in the shoulder of his t-shirt.

Oikawa’s stomach flips when Iwaizumi looks at him again, and he lets Iwaizumi gather his wrists in one hand and hold them above his head. The other splays out on Oikawa’s stomach and it flips a second time.

“That’s more like it, Iwa-chan.”

.

It’s not entirely a grunt and it’s not entirely a groan, the noise that Oikawa makes as Iwaizumi digs his thumbs into his traps. It’s just a noise, Iwaizumi decides, that he likes – proper term irrelevant. 

“You’re really tight,” he says.

From his spot on the floor in front of the edge of Iwaizumi’s bed where Oikawa sits so Iwaizumi can work more easily, Oikawa only turns his head enough to give him a side-eye and half-assed grin. Iwaizumi enjoys that he’s capable of doing something Oikawa likes enough to actually shut up.

“I hope you’re doing this yourself, too.”

“How’s that?”

“Put a tennis ball between the muscle you want to work and a wall and press back till you feel pressure that’s uncomfortable but not painful. I do it for myself all the time.”

“It is really a massage if you do it to yourself?”

“This isn’t a massage, asshole. It’s myofascial release. I just haven’t gotten to the part that hurts yet.”

“Are you sure you went to school for this? Massages are supposed to feel good, Iwa-chan.”

“You’ll feel good tomorrow.”

“Have you ever known me to be patient?”

Iwaizumi sighs. Thinks for a moment. “Alright, lie on your stomach.”

Oikawa, still half-sleep, rises with a groan (this time, definitely a groan) and crawls like a child up past their bedtime to the center of Iwaizumi’s bed. Iwaizumi grabs something from his work bag and moves to sit atop his waist. Oikawa hums with his eyes closed.

“This’ll be cold, but it’ll take the edge off.”

He sprays a menthol solution across Oikawa’s neck and shoulders and down his back. Oikawa flinches, but after Iwaizumi’s warm fingers return, he finds the familiar cooling sensation more than pleasant. It doesn’t quite numb the area, but it helps him relax the muscles he tenses unconsciously throughout the day. 

“Do you foam roll?”

“Yeah, mostly my legs.” Oikawa mumbles into the comforter.

Iwaizumi works up high for several minutes before placing hands on either side of Oikawa’s spine a few inches above the waistline. They’re exploratory at first, lacking real pressure, but there’s one area that’s particularly sensitive and Oikawa jumps involuntarily. 

“One hell of a knot there.”

He works it for a while.

“Sure you don’t wanna betray Shorty and Ushiwaka and join our side?” Oikawa says between breathes Iwaizumi reminds him to keep taking.

“What, your trainer’s no good?”

“He’s plenty good, but nobody’s got your hands, Iwa.”

Iwaizumi snorts. “Even if it’s not bothering you at the time, try and hit your back when you roll, too. You’ll end up pulling something when you serve eventually, otherwise. Do the tennis ball for your shoulders when you can’t get with your trainer.”

Oikawa doesn’t respond yet. It certainly is one hell of a knot, and he shuts his eyes and presses his lips together while Iwaizumi applies pressure that’s almost too much. Then Iwaizumi pulls back and Oikawa practically shudders.

“Sorry,” Iwaizumi says, sitting back. “It’s four-thirty. You should probably shower and head back to your room.”

Oikawa turns over on his back and rubs his hands up and down Iwaizumi’s forearms. “Yes, what would they say about you aiding the enemy? ‘Did you see? Oikawa returned from somewhere before the sun came up today – who could he have been visiting?’”

The corners of Iwaizumi’s lips curl. “As if they’d have to wonder.”

Oikawa props himself up on one elbow and reaches to place a hand behind Iwaizumi’s neck. He pulls him down and kisses him. Is kissed back.

“I’ll think about you tomorrow. When my neck –” another kiss. “– and my shoulders –” another. “– and my back –” just one more. “ – feel good.”


End file.
